Damsons and Sun Showers
by myselfonly
Summary: An age old conversation between Gimli and Legolas, and not much else. The boys discuss their friends and who is faster, stronger, fairer. Friendship and plotless fluff, because I've almost forgotten what it feels like. Stands entirely alone. First of three in the anniversary fics for The Silence in the Song. Happy second birthday, Silence! :)


**Welcome, everyone, to the first of three anniversary fics celebrating the birthday of my multichapter fic, The Silence in the Song. Silence turns two years old on Sunday, and I can honestly say that it's been one hell of a slog but more than worth it.**

**This one is entirely un-beta'd (as most of my work is) but only because I didn't think Lindir's Ghost would forgive me for launching three fics on her to read through rather than the two that she got, especially when I said it would be one. Thanks love! I am a cheeky cow, I know :)**

**Special thanks go to my regular reviewers, especially those that have been there since the very beginning. You guys have kept me going, and have been so, so supportive over a very difficult few months. Silence will not hit three years, but that is not to say that I am going anywhere.**

**A super special shout out to my good friend Vanimalion, who I met on this site a lifetime ago and lives a whole world away from me. We have gone from occasional emails to interwebs chats, meeting in London and then ridiculously long FaceTimes. Thanks for being a bro, bro. You made me laugh when I was at my worst, and I am sorry that I ate your mini eggs. I have bought you two packets to replace them, and will post them forthwith.**

**I really hope you all enjoy this. Those that have been following Silence will know that it's terribly, terribly gloomy right now, but all three anniversary fics are much more light hearted, so I hope you like the return to better times. To any new readers who might have appeared, pull up a pew. If you enjoy this (which I hope you do) there's plenty more where this came from :)**

**MyselfOnly**

* * *

~{O}~

"Aragorn," Legolas says, quite certainly, and I blink.

We have not been speaking. We have been silent for a while now, and I look around in case our friend might have somehow appeared. He has not.

We walk through very thick woods. I can hear the snap and crunch of my own feet in the deep undergrowth, the jangle and bump of my pack, but from the elfling I hear nothing at all. It is only birdsong and the rustling of trees.

"What?"

"You asked me," Legolas clarifies, "you asked who I thought might be faster – Faramir or Aragorn. I say Aragorn."

I try to recall when I might have asked such a thing, and I feel my eyes rise to the heavens unbidden. Mahal… sweet Mahal grant me strength.

"Legolas that was two days ago," I try to keep my voice steady. "I thought that you had not heard me. I also asked you whether you wanted fish or game that night. You need not reply to that now."

"I heard you," he shrugs, "I just did not think on it until now. It does not seem so long ago that you asked, are you sure it was two days ago?"

"Certain," I grit between my teeth. "Do you listen to me at all?"

"Not all of the time," he admits, and waits whilst I clamber over a fallen tree that blocks our way. I am unsure as to whether I am offended. "You talk much, but it is a comfort."

"You told me that it is annoying."

"It is also annoying. Who rides better – Éowyn or Éomer?"

"I shall tell you in a few days," I grump through my beard, folding my arms, and he laughs. It is a pleasant laugh, light and open, and I feel the knot of annoyance melt away before it truly had chance to form. He shoves me and I stagger, and I cannot help but laugh as well.

"Éowyn, although do not tell Éomer I said such a thing; he is sensitive. Who would win in a fight then – Elladan or Elrohir?"

"Without a weapon, Elrohir; he fights like a tavern brawler. Elladan with a blade. Who is fairer – Éowyn or Lothiriel?"

"The _edain_ look very similar to me," I shrug, "I can see that they are both fair, but I could not say who is fairer."

Legolas considers this, and after a moment he tilts his head in grudging agreement. He nods, and admits: "I could learn to tell them apart better if their faces did not change constantly. Generations, all similar in feature, different every time I see them. It is endlessly annoying."

Legolas often confuses sons and fathers and grandfathers with one another. Elves do not change, and elves do not notice the passage of time… it must be terribly unsettling, us constantly rearranging our faces when he is not looking.

"Faramir or Almárean with the bow?" he asks.

"Almárean," I reply, "although not by much. Who is faster out of you and Idhren, and do you think all dwarves look alike?"

"Idhren in the trees, I am faster upon open ground. And yes, but only when you are together."

"Truly?" I frown, and I take a pause. We have come to a steep gulley with a quagmire of thick mud at the bottom, and I have slipped and skidded my way down but now Legolas must help me over it. I still manage to put my feet afoul at least three times, and now I am caked in mud to the shins. I flick some at the elfling, because he has managed to get across without getting any on him at all, and he eyes me flatly as though I am the most childish thing he has ever met. I say that I am sorry but I am not.

"Yes," he says certainly. "When you stand together I can only pick you out because you are often the one talking. Do not be insulted; you do insist on covering your faces with hair."

"How can I not find that insulting?" I demand, aghast, but he is laughing heartily now. I cannot tell if he is laughing at my umbrage, or because he is simply trying to get a rise out of me.

I storm ahead, muttering angrily beneath my breath, but all I can hear is his laughter following me off into the woods.

~{O}~

Legolas has been leading me all day to a place that he knows – some kind of secret – and he will not tell me where we are going or why.

We fight through some of the most tangled and difficult undergrowth that I have ever crawled through. I am scratched to ribbons, I have burrs in my beard, and I consider more than once simply sitting down and refusing to get up again, but of course I cannot. He seems very pleased with himself… excited, and keeps looking back to check on me with a quiet delight that I cannot deny, no matter how much I wish to.

It is later, when I am sat in a forgotten fruit orchard, that I forgive him for the bleeding and battered state I am in.

I have soft, sun warmed damsons, clouded black and green and purple in a tumbling pile upon the ground. Sharp gooseberries and trailing vines of blackcurrants, the smell ripe and familiar to me like a memory of childhood. My hands are stained and I do not care, my beard sticky with fruit juice, and Legolas grins at me.

He is an elfling, cross legged and mouth stained with strawberries, bright eyed and happy. He seems very proud of himself, and I cannot fault him for it. Legolas knows all of the secret places, the good places, and this is a very good place. He is watching me very closely but I do not mind; he is happy that I am enjoying myself, and I feel a fondness for him right now. Such feelings are always swift to vanish so I allow it, and I flick another damson stone off into the thick grasses.

"You will be sick if you eat much more," he tells me.

"I may be sick, I may not. I leave my fate in the hands of the Valar," I tell him, and I carry on.

I am not sick.

~{O}~

He has found us a place to camp that is mostly moss, and although it is fairly damp, it is no damper than the rest of the wood. It is certainly softer. I am using my axe to dig a space clear enough to build a fire, and if my weapons master could see me now his beard would grey instantly. This is a finely wrought axe, and I should not be using it as a spade. I have got into some terrible habits of late.

I feel as though I am encased in greenery. The moss is thick upon the ground, growing over hillocks that I think might be boulders and fallen trees, and it grows up the tree trunks until it feels as though I have been swallowed by the forest.

The sun is setting and shines amber through the trees – burning summer red, furious gold – and I can barely see through it. I am squinting until my eyes water, and it is making my beard glow terribly. Even I can see it; a red nimbus on the lower edge of my vision, distracting and bright.

Legolas is fidgety, wandering around and unable to settle on one task at a time. He crouches by my pack – open and with my things spilling out – and he picks up my helmet. It is steel and leather and I prize it greatly, and although I have little cause to wear it of late, I still carry it with me. He hefts it a few times.

"This is heavy," he decides, and fixes me with an uncomfortable stare. The sun is in his eyes and it turns them into silver blue darts, unusual and unpleasant to be fixed beneath. "You might grow taller if you wore something lighter upon your head."

I reach over and snatch it out of his hands.

"I am a correct and sensible height," I snap at him. "And I wear it because I have something worth protecting between my ears."

"If you were taller, people would be less likely to hit you upon the head," he points out, as though it is something obvious that I simply had not thought of before. "And in any case, I… Gimli can you move into the shade? You look as though your face is on fire, it is distracting."

My hand goes to my face unconsciously, patting my beard, and for a moment I might be annoyed but instead I cannot help but laugh – deep and loud. He smiles as well, purely because I am laughing – unbidden and genuine.

"Who would win in a fight?" I ask him, still laughing. "Ionwë or your father? And you are very fidgety this afternoon."

"It is going to rain soon," he tells me. I look up at the patch of pure blue sky bracketed between the trees, and I frown. He has been wrong before, I am sure he has.

An hour later we are crouched inside the innards of a huge and ancient rhododendron, thick bladed leaves tangled above us and twisted branches locking us deep inside. It smells of rain, wet moss and the sharp tang of dry and forgotten leaves. The rain hammers hugely, loud and thundering, and I pull my knees closer.

Legolas pulls open a bag of fruit that we have brought with us and we both retrieve a prize, the taste of sunlight in the pouring rain. I look up through the branches above us, the weaving pillars of our mighty hall rising way above us to the canopy of green. I wonder how old it is to have grown so huge, and I bite into my damson.

"They are both fine warriors, I have no idea at all," he tells me, finally answering my earlier question. "Perhaps we should suggest a fight the next time we are at the palace?"

I imagine it – Legolas and I suggesting that the terrifying general and winter cold king have a wrestling match to settle our curiosity – and I laugh again. Once I am started I cannot stop, and Legolas begins to laugh with me.

We sit like fools, hiding in a bush from the pounding rain, and we laugh like boys.

Some days are better than most.

END


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